The Client
A regional social services agency.
The Challenge
A fledgling charity was looking to hire its first Executive Director. It had limited resources and had been largely dependent on the volunteer Board to support programming and operations. By the very nature of its work, it had to safeguard its clients’ privacy, even to the extent it couldn’t identify the location of its support facility. It needed to find an experienced, well qualified individual, preferably with an existing network, to facilitate collaboration and partnerships. A secondary objective was to identify other potential staff or Board members through this process. It was anticipated that only a limited pool of potential candidates would be available for selection. The campaign had to run over the busy Christmas holiday season.
The Approach
The Osborne Principal worked with the executive of the Board to build a job description that would align with the organization’s objectives and a posting that would attract the highest number of quality candidates. Talent attraction software was utilized to manage the applicants’ cover letters and resumes drawn into a customized web portal. Knock-out questions assisted in filtering out unsuitable candidates and the hiring committee had direct access to be able to rank and comment on the applicants. LinkedIn and Indeed were the primary social media platforms for the search, however, the Principal managed the headhunting himself in order to keep the approach discreet and ensure existing relationships in the sector weren’t compromised.
The Result
The client was both surprised and impressed by the number of quality candidates it had to choose from and the speed by which the process unfolded. The posting went up November 30th and with Osborne’s help on due diligence and contract preparation an ideal candidate was offered the job and accepted by December 31st. The client retained access to the full applicant list for a year for potential further recruitment and industry support.